1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to Web-based collaborative diagram creation, storage and management.
2. Description of the Prior Art and Related Information
Remote selling has matured over the past several years as vendors have sought out ways to “erase” the line and distance between vendor and customer. The key to success in this effort is to find ways to simulate face-to-face customer communication, or at least derive all of the benefits of face-to-face communication, without carrying over the drawbacks.
Whiteboards, or chalk talks, are very common in a sales situation, as a great deal of the sales effort is geared towards customer education. Concepts, problems, business strategies, product solutions, configurations, are all common topics for chalk talk or whiteboarding sessions. For a remote sales force to be effective at selling, vendors must have the ability to conduct these activities remotely as effectively as they would in a face-to-face meeting.
Conventionally, sales representatives have utilized graphics programs such as Microsoft's PowerPoint application to generate diagrams representing, for example, the customer's current installed base, desired products or solution. Collaborative Web tools such as those offered by Webex® (for example) have been useful in that regard, and allow vendors and customers to simultaneously view the same diagram. However, graphics programs such as Microsoft's PowerPoint® are limited in their usefulness and programs such as VISIO®, although complete, are complex and present a steep learning curve. Moreover, such tools are not Web-enabled. Therefore, sales representatives have traditionally not used such applications as sales tools when conferencing with a customer or prospective customer over the Web. Where Visio® diagrams are used for business presentations over the Web and shared across a network, they have conventionally engendered massive stencil files that are awkward to store on the network and to download to the user's desktop. The alternative is to forego sharing the diagrams between sales representatives and to force sales representatives to regenerate very similar diagrams time after time. This also has the undesirable consequence of the sales representative's employer loosing control over the content created by its sales representatives. Indeed, it is common for some sales representatives to take their diagrams and generated content with them when they leave for another employer. This results in a steep learning curve for the new sales representative, who must regenerate the content him or herself by again interviewing the customer to again ascertain their current needs and installed base of products.
What are needed, therefore, are methods and systems for cooperatively developing diagrams with a customer or a prospective customer that are easy to use and to maintain. What are also needed are methods and systems for centrally storing, managing and maintaining control over the content (such as graphics files) generated by the sales representatives and their customers.